Burren Programme Resources

The Burren Programme Team has set up useful Checklists for farmers to use, for a number of different areas.  These are short documents that you can download and they contain guidelines  as to what to do, and not to do, in the course of Burren Programme work:

Optimising your (I-1) Field Score

Removal of Encroaching Scrub

Wall Repair, Fence and Gate installation

Water Management – provision and protection

Vehicle Access Provision

During the course of the BurrenLIFE Project (2005 to 2010) a number of helpful guides where produced, that are still very applicable today, and should be used together with the BP checklists:

A Guide to Farming for Conservation in the Burren – BurrenLIFE Best Practice Guide No. 1

The Agricultural Heritage of the Burren – BurrenLIFE Best Practice Guide No. 2

Sustainable Grazing of Burren Winterages – BurrenLIFE Best Practice Guide No. 3

A Guide to Feeding Cattle on Burren Winterages – BurrenLIFE Best Pratice Guide No. 4

A Guide to Controlling Scrub on Burren Winterages and Other Areas – BurrenLIFE Best Practice Guide No. 5

The BP trained Advisor firstly visits the fields in order to obtain the I-1 score.  The Advisor, in the field, will need the Winterage Score Sheet or the BLG Field Sheet, depending on whether they are assessing a Winterage or a Burren lowland grassland (BLG).  The Guideline document, Guidelines Scoring Burren Winterages General Instructions and Guidelines accompanies the Winterage Scoring Sheet, giving guidelines on how to score a Burren Winterage. For BLG scoring the Advisor can reference the guideline document Scoring Burren Lowland Grasslands, General Instructions & Guidelines.    Once back in the office the Advisor then inputs the data into the relevant excel calculator;  into the Winterage Calculator for the Winterage fields and into the BLG Calculator for the BLG fields to obtain the I-1 score for the field.  The final stage of the process is inputting the scores and the management recommendations for all the BP fields into the most recent I-1 workbook, (dated 25^th February 2021, password protected for BP Advisors only) and any changes to areas into the area matrix excel sheet.  Once the Advisor is happy, with the plan, the necessary files are emailed to the BP team for processing.

New I-2 workbook dated January 2021 – Password protected for use by Burren Programme Advisors only.  Also, available Guidelines to Advisors to help them with completing the I-2 Workbook. Additionally, we have included a  Sample eligible receipt handout for any farmers who need receipts when purchasing items. This handout will help the farmer and the shop owner prepare receipts that are DAFM compliant.

AECOM Ltd. were contracted in early 2020 to assess the economic, social and environmental impacts of the Burren Programme. The Evaluation Report is available here.

AECOM Ltd found that the Burren Programme – and previous iterations of the programme – has resulted in significant social impacts, and has been successful in strengthening ties among farmers in the Burren, as well as fostering a shared Burren farming identity. The Programme has also been successful in strengthening ties between farmers and other stakeholders and organisations outside of the region, including the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine.

Commenting on the evaluation, Minister Hackett stated,

“AECOM Ltd found that the Burren Programme has been successful in encouraging sustainable grazing and feeding systems, and removing encroaching scrub on over 23,000 hectares, providing space for rare flowers, such as orchids and gentians, to flourish. AECOM Ltd estimates that the value of habitat and landscape improvements delivered amount to €32.8 million since 2010, and highlights that the Burren Programme is an efficient and effective model for delivering environmental improvements.”

AECOM Ltd. estimates that the Burren Programme and its predecessor, the Burren Farming for Conservation Programme, have also provided a boost to the local economy and generated €30.3 million in economic activity since 2010. The report also states that the local economic impact has been particularly high, as farmers are encouraged to use local contractors, businesses and crafts people.

Burren Programme Brochure

With the introduction of Tranche 3 and Tranche 4 farmers in January 2018, the Terms and Conditions for the Burren Programme were updated.  Here you will find the most recent  Terms and Conditions.

The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine (DAFM), along with EU under the Rural Development Programme 2014-2020 have published this handbook on the European Innovation Partnership for Agriculture Productivity and Sustainability (EIP-AGRI) Operational Groups. This booklet contains a summary of the 23 EIP-AGRI projects that DAFM have selected.

EIP-AGRI Operational Group Booklet 2019

 To cite this publication: Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. 2019. EIP-AGRI: Ireland’s Operational Groups 2019
Prepared by the National Rural Network team at NUI Galway on behalf of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine
Designed by Dr. Shane Conway, Postdoctoral Researcher at NUI Galway and the National Rural Network.

In March 2016, as part of the National Economic & Social Council (NESC) Research Series, “The Burren Life Programme: An Overview”  by Dr Brendan Dunford was published.  This was part of the NESC Research Series which provides analysis of economic, social or environmental evidence and policy.  A list of the full set of NESC publications is available at www.nesc.ie

This overview traces the evolution, of the Burren Programme in order to tell the full ‘story’ of this locally led programme, to extract key learnings and to discuss how these learnings might inform other regions and other actors in the arena of agri-environmental stewardship.  The structure of this paper follows a logical flow: the main phases of the Programme’s evolution are described (Initial context, Research phase, Roll-out phase), followed by a discussion and some conclusions which look at some of the lessons learned and how they might be integrated into policy.

Please note that this article was published in 2016, and therefore covers the Burren LIFE project and Burren Farming for Conservation Programme and Burren Life Programme.  Burren Programme, the latest phase of this story,  was only beginning in 2016 at time of publication.

This report looks at the potential synergies between biodiversity and water quality delivery on High Nature Value (HNV) farmland. The authors describe HNV farmland in an Irish context and discuss the potential co-benefits of HNV farmland for biodiversity and water quality. The objectives of the study were to:

• explain the HNV farming concept;
• describe the distribution of HNV farmland in Ireland and explain the characteristics of HNV farmland in an Irish context;
• show the spatial distribution of HNV farmland in relation to high-status water bodies;
• discuss the support measures available for HNV farming and the potential for design of measures to provide both enhanced biodiversity and water quality in HNV areas.

Link to the Report: Please feel free to circulate this link to any interested parties.

Authors: James Moran and Caroline Sullivan